Film Reviews by AER

This Australian ghost story adopts the 'true-story' documentary format which works well initially but as time goes on the framing device betrays some unconvincing twists in the narrative. The faux-documentary device keeps the film inhabitants at arm's length and when the unconvincing twist turns up at the half-way mark it's too late to trust anyone. The performances are uniformly good but anybody that's seen enough talking heads documentaries will catch these guys acting here and there.

All things considered, the story is very good and hasn't been done before. It's very creepy in parts but the post-credit sequences are plain stupid and make the characters look like a bunch of idiots - and sadly the parting shots cheapen the exercise. It's definitely worth a look, as some aspects are chilling but its narrative was inconsistent at times and ultimately, this rendered the film unconvincing which is a shame because the makers were clearly striving for authenticity.

5 out of 10

Freaky is one of those films you wished you'd have seen at a lively cinema screening (good luck if you are in the UK - our audiences are so quiet). I saw it at the cinema with about 6 people and I did hear a few people titter or mildly shriek, so that's a good sign. Freaky took a while to warm up, beginning with a rote prequel where the Blissfield Butcher wipes out a bunch of dopey teens, and then introduced our heroine, Millie, who is the school outsider/geek. Through some contrivance, they swap bodies via a piece of Poundland jewelry and then the high concept kicks into gear. A lot of fun is had with the murders, the confusion, the chases, and Vince Vaughn's convincing take on playing a 16 year-old woman... However, this is a one-off watch, something of a Big Mac movie that serves as a fun time-passer but doesn't excel itself beyond that (which is OK). It reminded me of a Scream sequel and Nightmare on Elm Street 2 (which was the first big Gay horror film). Also look out for Alan Ruck from Ferris Bueller's Day Off as a real douchebag of a teacher!

Fun times, watch with friends for maximum results.

Like a musical version of Derek Jarman's Last of Britain mixed with Terry Gilliam's early films, IT COULDN'T HAPPEN HERE is a true 80s oddity. Stranded in an 80s wasteland between arthouse and pop promo kitsch it's easy to say that the Pet Shop Boys didn't really know what kind of films their legions of fans liked when this was released. I remember a work colleague telling me that people were walking out in droves at the cinema screening she attended and that it was terrible. Taken on it's own terms, it's definitely marching to it's own drum, but when compared to other films that were playing in mainstream cinemas at the time, this was an inaccessible and woeful peace of entertainment to the masses. Nowadays the BFI have seen fit to restore it and reappraise in view of what England and the Pet Shop Boys have become. It's still pretty impenetrable but it's a film from a time and place in British history when British films were few and far between but still had a lot of heart and originality. There's lot of PSB songs and some striking imagery to recommend it like a zebra on a train, a commuter on fire, nuns in suspenders and Gareth Hunt with giant fake ears. However, there's no narrative, the acting is uniformly awful (even by the pros like Barbara Windsor and Joss Ackland) and it only really works as a curio for PSB fans who never got around to seeing it years ago. An oddity but an interesting one all the same.

SPOILER ALERT

If you know My Cousin Rachel by Daphne DuMaurier then you will have seen this story before. Denzel Washington and Rami Malek team up to solve a murder mystery. Someone is killing girls in LA, and their prime suspect is Jared Leto. There's a tantalising mystery at play here, and it's unwillingness to go to bat for the slow ones in the class is commendable. It's worth a second watch to look for small clues and to shake out what our main characters might be hiding. It's also good because our 'good guys' have suitable murky motives and once it's all over and step back a few paces to see the big picture, it works very well as a very paranoid man covering his tracks to account for earlier mistakes. You leave the film wondering one thing though, why did so many people cover for him, this aspect was too elaborate.

In the Heights is a very pleasant surprise in a world of endless sequels and reboots; it's a true original with lots of its own ideas. Throwing the spot light on the NuYorican community of Washington Heights in Manhattan, this has several characters with positive aspirations and ideals to follow. This wins for energy, it's charming leading man, great dance numbers and quite a lot of flare. Where it failed for me, was the lack of story thrust, and the sheer number of songs it packs into its running time. None of the songs stuck in my head like in other recent musics like The Greatest Showman, and La La Land, but the set-pieces are largely memorable. The dance in the swimming pool to celebrate a mystery lottery win is stand out, and a ghostly life-story told in flashback sepia tones is also great. The story isn't very original and the running time is excessive but the focus on Puerto-Ricans is interesting and largely new to a British audience. In The Heights is an awesome feel good movie that deserves an audience, although I feel it won't endure as much as those I mentioned above....

7 out of 10

Engrossing documentary about triplet brothers who were separated at birth and discovered each other in their late teens. What became of them after their initial flirtation with fame? Why were they separated? Why was the reason hidden from the families who adopted them? And what was the outcome? It's an interesting tale, although anybody that has studied psychology will know the outcome to this interesting documentary. Like all detective stories, the journey is as interesting as the destination, but its all about the reveal and this is good for one watch. A decent curio - but it has the page-turner qualities of a TV documentary, not a cinema feature. It's a headline grabber and not an education piece at the end of the day.

Moving story, an all too-human one. Recommended.

The makers of this film must enjoy being the big-budget underachievers they are. Paul WS Anderson is perhaps the worst script and story writer working at this level in Hollywood. All his high-concept movies are hilariously bad with zero characterisation or room for longeurs. Their MO is action, action, action until I fart. And in that respect Monster Hunter delivers, when it stops for breath it stinks. There is no plot logic or any real intelligence to any of this, but then I wasn't expecting any, but even for Paul WS Anderson and Milla Jovovich, this is very thin material. They didn't even write Tony Jaa's dialogue, he just mutters in an indecipherable dialect, and all the other people in the film got wiped out quickly (sometimes off-screen) pity Tip Harris, Meagan Good, and Diego Boneta - they have zero to do. Even luckier is Ron Perlman in one of his strangest roles as The Admiral. He looks like an aged version of a power ballad singer, and he really looks like he's would sooner be elsewhere. Monster Hunter is occasionally fun, it's not excruciating, but with a bit more effort this could have been really cool like Pitch Black or Starship Troopers.... I didn't think they made them like this for the cinema anymore!

Hilariously bad in every way.

2 out of 10

You won't see many dramas more predictable than FINDING YOUR WAY BACK, a small-scale vehicle for Ben Affleck's considerable talents. The actor impresses as an alcoholic given a shot at redemption when he is asked to coach a basketball team at his former school. Keeping a lid on his drinking becomes a problem when pressures mount from all sides. We learn about his back story, and there is a moving but expected reason behind Ben's initial decent into alcoholism, and it seems added on. There are a lot of people who slide into drinking without reason and this aspect made the film less convincing in some respects. It was solid and very well-acted, however, it was unadventurous and had difficulty distinguishing itself from lesser made issues movies. Almost.

5 out of 10

Drew Goddard's follow-up to The Cabin in the Woods is an interesting type of noir thriller that you don't see all that often anymore. There were a rash of these kind of films in the 90s after Tarantino made a splash, but since, there's not been that many. The set-up is very intriguing with each of the characters / caricatures selling their own mystery and reason for holeing up at a weird Reno hotel that straddles state lines. A shifty priest, a girl with a hostage, a soul singer, a vaccum cleaner salesman, a mysterious concierge, and a cult leader all combine. The set=up and dialogue is brilliant and the film is reasonably inventive within its confines until the arrival of a pretty unimaginative character. When Chris Hemsworth's Billy Lee turns up, the life seems to get sucked out of the film. It's not the actor's fault, it's just that the character lacks intelligence or invention, and as he essentially takes the whole cast hostage the film becomes his show for a long time. It's a shame because this had momentum and was great fun up until the 1:20 mark. However, it's very long and at 2 hr 15 mins, it leaves a lot of space near the end to fill up. At first, I was utterly hooked - but this had nowhere to go in the end. At least it was original (for these days) and very watchable.

6 out of 10

Like Derek Kolstad's creation John Wick, Nobody brings enough verve and originality to a solid action thriller. The USP for Nobody is the stunt casting that doesn't just end at the leading man's doorstep. Bob Odenkirk is nearly 60 and does some serious fight work, backed by subtle acting and some very humourous character beats. This is NOT True Lies, where everyone is surprised at the main characters' double life, all those closest to him seem to know his past. Picture an action equivalent of David Cronenberg's A History of Violence and you might get close to seeing this for what it is.

Nobody is a very violent, very enjoyable popcorn movie that doesn't change the world, but entertains in a very accomplished way. Look out for Michael Ironside, Christopher Lloyd, and The Rza. Please don't make a sequel, one is enough - don't ruin this good thing with tired universe expanding bollocks, just because the neighbours are doing it. I don't want to see John Wick team up with Hutch Mansell anytime soon. zzzz

7.5 out of 10

Just watched The Father, for which Anthony Hopkins won his second best actor Oscar. For me he's never been better than in this really moving piece of cinema.

I wasn't expecting much really, and saw it on a whim, but I'm so glad I did. It's merciless in its unsentimentality. It's too truthful, and more frightening than any horror film I'll see in a while.

Trust me, this was truly immersive and if you like Anthony Hopkins, I can only think of one other occasion he was close to being this good, and that was in The Remains of the Day. Olivia Williams and Olivia Colman were so good too. An intelligent yet very accessible drama. More like this please!

10 out of 10

That actors age and fade away is perhaps the only clue as to the age of a Jim Jarmusch film. His films never age and a film made last week could so easily have been made in 1989 and vice versa - his style never changes. It's a good job there's still people around to fund his brand of deadpan comedy, I for one have been a fan ever since I went to see Night On Earth at the cinema back in 1992, and Mystery Train is probably the closest in spirit to that film. Three interlinking stories revolving around a fleapit hotel in Memphis all involve Elvis Presley in some shape or form. The first two films are sublime exercises in comedy, however the third on drags and is let down by Joe Strummer's dodgy acting. Fans of Jarmusch knwo what to expect, slow pace, cool character beats and magic in the mundane. The international cast of actors and musicians are so impressive. This is Top 5 Jarmusch for me. Also see Lovers Left Alive, Dead Man, Ghost Dog, and Patterson.

Fast-paced sequel, that like most follow-ups seems redundant storywise. There's not much time for mourning as this film picks up directly after the last one finished, and we're pretty much straight into the action. Putting the 'sound monsters' into a more prominent position, it's a miracle that there's any tension left to dispense but fortunately there is. This time the central family are looking for refuge after their home is destroyed at the end of the first film, but much of what is introduced has been seen in other films/TV shows like The Road, The Walking Dead, Oblivion. It's Millicent Simmonds deaf child, who is once more, the main reason to buy a ticket, it's her bravery and invention that saves the day again and again. Cillian Murphy's new male lead is little more than a cipher, and Djimon Hounsou is even more wasted in a thankless role close to the end. A Quiet Place and this sequel are elevated from the dreck by good performances and good set-pieces. With it's unique position to give some sheen to the horror genre, it should have been less predictable and brought a few new ideas of its own to the party.

However, it was action-packed, scary, and it made me root for the main characters. So, in the main, it was a cool time killer.

Stuber was the funniest American comedy I've seen in a very long time. It hardly breaks new ground but it had a lot of energy, set-pieces and inventive one-liners to keep me glued. I can't even remember adding this to my Cinema Paradiso list as the last few comedies I've rented like The Longshot, Blockers, and Tag have all been really, really poor. Temporarily short-sighted cop teams up with a Pakistani-American uber driver to track down a drug dealer with hilarious results. The action isn't too shoddy either, although the big bad played by The Raid's Iko Uwais is completely wasted, he's in two fight scenes (on great / one so-so) and a car chase, and has no character and about two lines of dialogue. Dave Bautista and Kumail Nanjiani are great together exchanging a lot of withering putdowns.

Stupid, instantly disposable, but for my money, it's the best 'new' comedy I've seen in a very, very long time. 4 out of 5 for doing what it came to do, make me laugh.

I don't know how Almodovar makes light work of really dense material - there's always something of the daytime soap opera about his films and Live Flesh is no different (with added sex/nudity). Live Flesh never comes to life though, each of the characters are propelled through a narrative that has no engine or makes any sense to the rational viewer. I'm not a fan of Almodovar, but I've seen quite a few of his films and I will say that he is getting better and better. It was interesting to see Javier Bardem in an early role, look out for his real-life mother in early scenes (Pilar Bardem). Based on a pulpy novel by Ruth Rendell, this is full of murder and intrigue but it hops along at fast pace without delving into the characters at all, leaving it without substance and altogether forgettable and stupid.